


(i would give it all for) one last chance

by behradtarazi



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Obi-Wan Kenobi Needs a Hug, Post-Order 66, but that’s not like a super main thing?, shocker ikr, there’s also mentions of padmé ahsoka luke and leia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-25
Updated: 2020-02-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:40:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22890385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/behradtarazi/pseuds/behradtarazi
Summary: Obi Wan is alone now, alone on Tatooine with nothing but a mission to protect young Luke and grief for all he lost so quickly.
Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 1
Kudos: 33





	(i would give it all for) one last chance

Sometimes, Obi Wan will sit outside at night and remember how much Anakin hated this place.

He's been on Tatooine for years now. He's growing to hate it too.

( _You still don't understand,_ says a voice in the back of his head that sounds suspiciously like his former Padawan. _You will never understand._

There is a lot about Anakin he will never understand.)

On his worst mornings, or maybe his best, Obi Wan wakes up and thinks that it had all been a cruel dream. That Anakin will come around the corner, hair mussed, scowling, grumbling about the sand. That Padmé will be right beside him, smiling. That he can do it all over, all again. That he can save the Jedi Order.

But in the end, the heat hits him, and the ache settles back into his bones, and he knows. He knows.

There are some things that cannot be undone.

There are some things that cannot be undone, but all he has left are hurting and longing, and so too often he thinks that he would do anything to see Anakin again, even behind that damn mask, even with his red lightsaber burning.

Anakin's last, agonized _I hate you_ rings in his ears, and all Obi Wan can think is, _I don't. I never could. Not you._

He remembers the night they met on Tatooine, and wonders how they fell so far. They were so young. They were so young.

He's not sure if he's grieving for his brother or for the small, selfless boy who could have been - anything. Everything.

_No, I couldn't have. No. No. You know what I was, you know who I belonged to -_

Obi Wan can't shut out Anakin's voice. Most of the time, he doesn't want to. But it is very hard, to try to move on when someone keeps holding you back. It is very hard, to try to lie to yourself when someone keeps telling the truth.

The truth.

He gets so much more of that from his ghost than he ever did from his real Padawan.

He's not sure where Anakin learned to lie like that.

Something tells him he should know. Something tells him he should have asked when he had the chance to.

There are a lot of things he should have asked.

But he was trying to do what he was taught to do. He was trying to teach Anakin to be a Jedi, to follow the doctrine - to do things the traditional way. They way Anakin didn't do with Ahsoka.

And look at them now.

He failed him. He failed him. That has to be the case. What other explanation could there be?

There's no one left for him to apologize to, but if there was, stars, the things he would say. He doesn't think he'd ever be able to stop if he started. He thinks he might die mid word.

I'm sorry, Master Qui Gon, for not raising him to be the man you thought he would be…

I'm sorry, Padmé, for not being able to save you…

I'm sorry, Anakin, for - I'm sorry. For everything. Everything.

_Idiot._

The sand in the wind looks like the profile or a man, for a moment, and Obi Wan thinks he might be losing his mind, because all he can see is Anakin's smirk, the too-proud glint of it, the arrogance he used as armor.

He will be haunted to madness if he stays here, he knows it.

But he can’t leave. He can’t leave. How could he? Luke is here, growing more like his parents every day, and Obi Wan thinks he owes that much to them, to the two people he finds himself missing more than anything else in the galaxy.

Attachment is unavoidable. That’s clear to him now. Achingly so.

There is a night where he wakes up sobbing, and he has never been more grateful to be away from the Temple, away from the hundreds of minds attuned to the Force, away from the friends who would find him in his grief. Some misery is solitary. Some misery is best tormenting alone.

Besides, he wouldn’t wish this on anyone.

He stands out in the desert with Anakin’s lightsaber in his hand and he isn’t sure if the Force is telling him to throw it or if he is dehydrated to the point of delusion. Maybe it’s neither. Maybe he’s just telling himself that it’s one of them. Maybe Anakin wasn’t the liar in their team. Maybe he’s just desperately looking for a way to rid himself of the last physical reminder he has of his Padawan. Of his best friend. 

Of his brother.

He knows, deep down, that it won’t change anything. That it will only deny Luke or Leia the little legacy _Jedi Knight_ Anakin Skywalker could give them. That it will only give him a fleeting comfort.

Still. Logic seems to matter less out here. Though that’s likely the hurt speaking.

Obi Wan creates a routine, somehow. The normalcy in it all almost serves to make it worse in a way he doesn’t like thinking about. He would’ve done so much for some peace time only a short awhile ago, and now?

Nostalgia for the War feels wrong.

It feels wrong, and he refuses to let himself go as far as to say that he misses it. Not after everything, the deaths and the monumental prices the Jedi had to pay for small errors, again and again. He refuses, even if it might be slightly true.

Things were a little bit easier then, weren’t they? Absolute hell, but easier?

Stars, look at him. Longing for the _Clone War._

“Oh, what have I done?”

He’s not sure when he started talking to his ghost of Anakin out loud. He’s not going to stop anytime soon.

No, not anytime soon.

Maybe some day, in a prologue where his brother comes back to him and all is forgiven, immediately, always and forever. 

But not anytime soon.

Until then, he sits and waits and watches the sky.


End file.
